


From Cracked to Broken

by HungryLibrary



Category: RWBY
Genre: Brief Mention of Violence, Gen, breaking ruby for no good reason, faint hints of white rose, fear of losing everyone you love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-25
Updated: 2014-05-25
Packaged: 2018-01-26 11:15:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,706
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1686371
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HungryLibrary/pseuds/HungryLibrary
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ruby had survived losing one person she loved, but it hadn't made her stronger or more resilient. Quite the opposite in fact...</p>
            </blockquote>





	From Cracked to Broken

It starts with Blake’s disappearance.

 

She comes back in the end. She’d never really left anyway, just wandered off to find herself for a bit, and Ruby isn’t angry or even irritated, only happy that the team is back together.

But that doesn’t erase the hours of worry that came before.

With every step that didn’t lead to Blake and every minute their friend failed to reappear, the tide had been rising in Ruby’s chest.

Slow and cloying. Heavy like water in her lungs, stinging her throat with salt and bile until she had to run for the nearest café restroom-

What if they couldn’t find Blake…

What if they never saw her again?

A groundless fear, Ruby tells herself that night as they all slip into their beds. Everything is fine, everyone is here and safe and happy, she doesn’t have anything to worry about.

Hours later she rolls over with eyes red from lost sleep.

A careful twitch of her hand parts the makeshift curtains covering her bed. There isn’t much moonlight left by now but Ruby doesn’t need more than a little, just enough to see the steady rise and fall of the person in the lower bunk opposite her.

Blake looks calm in her sleep. Her head is turned away and her bow is still on, it’ll probably be a while before she feels comfortable enough to take it off for a second time, even in front of them… 

That’s fine.

Ruby hopes that- No, _knows_  they’ll have all the time in the world to be there for Blake. No one is going to leave.

But her heart feels hollow in spite of her own thoughts, and Ruby falls asleep only when her eyes grow too heavy to keep watch over her friend’s shadowy form.

-

The second time is somehow about Weiss.

Ruby doesn’t really understand what happened. Weiss seems to have decided on something, but she hasn’t explained the strange visitor to Ruby, or any of her own weird behavior during that week.

Blake and Yang probably have a better idea of things. She could ask them if she wanted to…

She doesn’t want to.

All Ruby knows, all she really cares about, is that her partner didn’t get on that air ship.

That’s the only thing that matters. Not how close Weiss came to leaving, just the fact that she chose to  _stay_.

She whispers those words to herself at midnight, almost a week after ‘The Decision’ was made. The words float up pale and cloudy in the cold- Little ghosts of the bad end that hadn’t happened…

…But, what if it  _did_  happen one day?

Ruby shivers in the chill and hugs her knees closer to her chest.

It’s a nippy night and she should be in bed or at least have brought a blanket out with her-

She hadn’t had any time, though.

She’d sneaked off her bunk to drape her cape over Weiss as her partner slept- The older girl never complained about the cold, but she was always extra crabby on the days following a freezing night- and while tucking her in Ruby’s hand had brushed against a strand of snowy hair-

A reverse thunderclap. That’s the only way she could describe it, even to herself, even almost an hour later.

Ruby’s heart had nearly squeezed itself to nothing under her ribs.

She was lucky her semblance was speed or else she probably would have woken half the dorm with her crying.

Now the tears had dried and flaked away in the winter wind. She should go back, Weiss would kill her if she caught a cold and slowed the team down-

Ruby buries her head in her knees and let her fingers dig painfully into the cold gooseflesh beneath her pajamas pants.

Weiss had stayed this time. She had chosen them, Ruby could walk into their room right now and find her peaceful and sleeping…

But a day might come when Ruby would open the door and find one bed empty.

She didn’t know if her heart could survive that.

-

The third time Yang is idiot.

Ruby has never used a word like that to describe her older sister before, but she does now, and adds a few more adult phrases to boot.

Only in her head, though.

Physically speaking she is shaking too hard even to stand, talking is way beyond her right now.

Even Crescent Rose is trembling. Little drops of blood and bits of Grimm slide off the steel, some hitting the ground before Ruby, some falling to stain her already splattered hands and arms.

Never in her life had she used the scythe with such speed.

“Ruby?”

And there is Yang.

Yang the Idiot. Yang the god damned fool-

Yang who had gotten between Ruby and the one Grimm that always sneaks up on you. Yang, her sister, who had nearly been  _cut in half_  as claws sliced easily through her battle-worn aura-

Yang who is kneeling down, never mind the pain, with worry in her voice as she reaches out to Ruby.

“Ruby, it’s okay. The Grimm are gone now-“

Her hand is warm and gentle and had come so close to only ever being  _cold,_  cold beneath cold dirt and colder stone-

Ruby jerks away. She can’t believe she has enough air in her lungs to speak, but the words are forcing their way out somehow.

“…You- you  _promised me._ ”

One sunny day when the skies should have been cloudy and grey, Yang had pulled her into a hug and said-

“You swore on mom’s grave that you’d  _Never._   _Leave. Me_.”

Talking while trying to catch her breath makes her lungs feel like they’re being skinned and set on fire.

In comparison, the rest of Ruby is numb with ice, fear…. And steady growing rage.

“Is that-“ She glares at the gashes in Yang’s side as if the sheer force of her gaze will make them heal faster.

“Is  _that_ how you’re going to stay with me? A rock with some more useless words carved in, another place for me to visit when I feel like leaping off a cliff?! I don’t need more gravestones, Yang! I just need you to be here-“

“I  _am._ ”

It’s more of a grab than a hug. Rough and hard enough to leave bruises later- but there  _would be_  a later-

“I’m right here…. It’s okay. I’m not going to leave, not ever.”

Heat soaks through Ruby’s cloak as Yang holds her. Straight through her clothes, her skin, until the ice in her bones begins to crack, begins to melt slowly away.

It hurts. It’s wonderful. She wants to struggle free, she never wants it to end.

But what if it  _did?_

What if she wasn’t there next time or she was too slow or-

“Shhh Ruby, I’ve got you. It’s okay now…”

_LIAR._

Ruby breaks free.

_Liar liar liar nothing’s okay it could all vanish in a second how can that EVER be okay-_

People don’t break Yang’s grip once she gets a hold on them. People don’t do that, stronger fighters got their asses beat trying, but Ruby  _does_.

And she runs.

Someone calls out to her ( _Yang_ ) Someone tries to get in her way and is pushed aside ( _Blake, sorry_ ) Someone flashes past as a blur with eyes wide and one hand reaching instinctively for Ruby-

**_Weiss._ **

The reverse thunderclap strikes again.

Her heart is being turned inside out by the empty vacuum in her chest and she can’t see where she’s going anymore, just away. Just away so she never has to see her sister dripping blood or watch Weiss pack her bags or wonder if Blake has any other secrets left that could tear them all apart….

If Ruby isn’t there for those things, then at least she won’t have to say goodbye.

If she doesn’t see them happen she can go the rest of her believing they  _didn’t._

Ruby runs.

They’ll come after her of course. They’ll try to catch her, hunt her down like a Grimm, use every trick to snare her-

But like her dead mother once said, Ruby’s semblance wasn’t _just_  speed.

_‘You were born to outrun your nightmares.’_  Summer Rose had said with a smile  _‘No matter how bad things get, Ruby, remember that you can always find a better ending if you look for it…’_

If Ruby hadn’t been sprinting full out she would have laughed and laughed and laughed until she cried even more than she already was.

_Because guess what mom? This time the ending IS the nightmare!_

_Still think I can outrun it?_

The shouts have started up behind her. Weiss will be in the air soon, maybe she’ll give Yang a lift, and they’ll be relying on Blake’s Faunus hearing to find Ruby in this mess of trees and undergrowth.

_Probably not._

Ruby slows down.

She’s still going faster than a Beowolf could run, but now she has time to dodge the branches and leaves that fly at her. Now she moves quick and quiet, and Blake would need the best hearing in Remnant to locate her with almost four miles already between them.  

_I’m not fast enough to escape my nightmare by running. No one can run forever without collapsing under the strain of it…_

A patch of darkness under a tree catches her eye.

In the past Ruby used to be annoyed at how slight and small she was compared to her dad and Yang. Now she’s glad of it, grateful she can slip between roots and into the tiny hollow that no normal person would think big enough to conceal a dog let alone a human in their teens.

_I can’t run forever, but maybe I can hide until they go away. Until_  everything  _goes away._

Curled up tight in the dark and the dirt, Ruby lets her eyes fall shut and tries to forget herself in a happy dream.

A dream where there were no goodbyes and her heart never felt like it was being torn apart… because there was nothing left for her to lose.

And Ruby decides she will stay right where she is until she can wake up to that dream. 


End file.
